<!DOCTYPE html>
<html>
<head>
<meta charset="UTF-8">
<title>All I Need is the Rest of Eternity by waywarddreamer</title>
<style type="text/css">

body { background-color: #ffffff; }
.CI {
text-align:center;
margin-top:0px;
margin-bottom:0px;
padding:0px;
}
.center   {text-align: center;}
.cover    {text-align: center;}
.full     {width: 100%; }
.quarter  {width: 25%; }
.smcap    {font-variant: small-caps;}
.u        {text-decoration: underline;}
.bold     {font-weight: bold;}
</style>
</head>
<body>
<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/25770205">All I Need is the Rest of Eternity</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/waywarddreamer/pseuds/waywarddreamer'>waywarddreamer</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>The Old Guard (Movie 2020)</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Andy POV - Freeform, Character Study, F/F, Family Dynamics, Future Fic, Gen, M/M, Nile appreciation, Team as Family, nile was the missing piece</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-08-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-08-07</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-05 06:22:29</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>1,761</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/25770205</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/waywarddreamer/pseuds/waywarddreamer</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>Andy knew that Nile’s bright-eyed demeanor could never last—that eventually she would get tired of seeing history repeat itself, tired of fighting for the same damn things to change.</p><p>And yet Nile still proves her wrong after all these years.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Andy | Andromache of Scythia &amp; Nile Freeman, Andy | Andromache of Scythia/Quynh | Noriko, Joe | Yusuf Al-Kaysani/Nicky | Nicolò di Genova</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>18</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>279</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>All I Need is the Rest of Eternity</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>So excited to write for this fandom for the first time! Hopefully I'll be able to write some more. Thank you to my beta reader @Ehwell made this fic a thousand times better.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>If they were all honest everyone—including Nile—thought that her unyielding passion was just a phase. Andy could feel her eyes on her even when Nile thought that she wasn’t paying attention, always with that same look—a mixture of awe and resigned hopelessness that she herself would inevitably become as jaded as the rest, a little too disconnected from humanity. The other immortals would shoot each other a look in a language that Nile has yet to learn, only taught through time as relentless and unfair as it was. It was still too soon for everyone to come to terms that she will end up like them.</p><p>Nicky clears his throat and once again relives the story of how he and Joe first met. Nile would become so enraptured that she would forget whatever she was mulling over, if only for a little while. Joe’s exasperation and Andy’s interjections about those lovestruck fools would fill the heavy air, and they all forgot for a little while.</p><p>But just how young her heart still shows whenever Booker gets involved. The mere mention of his name causes Nile’s eyes to harden and jaw to clench and Andy to remember just how young she really is—to Nile one century is a lifetime. This is how she knows that Nile sneaks out to see him because she answers too promptly whenever someone wonders aloud whether he is okay. They know Booker has never been good at being alone, even with missions. He would return from his post distracted, in a half-hearted excuse to be with someone. The rest of them said nothing, simply adjusting there ways to suit him and she will do the same now. Stopping Nile from seeing him would be pointless, it will only fuel her to go out more. Whenever Nile returns, walking into their hideout of the week smelling like the sea and brandy, Andy pretends to sleep and listens to the sound of Nile as she offers soft prayers for him in the dark to whoever may care enough to listen.</p><p>(Andy does).</p><p>Whenever Andy has to double back and make the rounds...she says nothing. It was something that started with the doctor more than fifty years prior and yet still continues even now. And still, every time, though she knows it must have been a long time ago, Andy wonders when the exact moment was that her own hope people could change died out—exactly how many people she killed that could have turned their life around. There’s a man sobbing on the floor, holding himself together, and she thinks about what Nile would do upon seeing him like this.</p><p>She lets him live.</p><p>Things change when Quynh finally returns to them after all those centuries. Andy allows herself to dream again and the first thing her lover wants to do is lunge at her throat. Upon seeing Quynh she forgets that while she is immortal she can still die, and Joe takes a sword for her. It’s only upon his blood that splatters across her cheek that allows her to unfreeze, and her lover’s eyes that always grounded her, left her world shattered by the hatred in them.</p><p>Andy is silent for days afterward, and no one can confront her. She can only imagine the pain that Quynh feels inside, the suffering that she was forced to endure for centuries locked under the relentless sea. Joe and Nicky know to leave her alone while she’s in her state, but she can see them exchange brief looks, sees the food that is always left on the counter. The wild head of hair that sometimes peaks out when she sits at the table in the dark.</p><p>Booker drinks with her, the only one who she’ll say a few words too.</p><p>Quynh would never forgive her for giving up. In the midst of her self-pity, it’s Nile who keeps pushing, who keeps inspiring her to keep looking, even after Andy finally snaps at her in her drunken stupor she worked really hard to get as it kept fighting its way out of her body. The younger woman sighs, before giving her a stare that was full of sadness and disappointment, before finally leaving her alone.</p><p>The world seems to rock underneath her like the first time she got up unscathed, the first time she realized that she was cursed. Her own body felt foreign, and that startling loneliness was the only emotion she felt. It’s the thought that she’s drowning herself that forces her to stop. Quynh doesn’t deserve that mockery of her suffering. For the first time in weeks, she falls asleep sober.</p><p>It is Booker that wakes her up with the news that Nile is missing. </p><p>They search with a ferocity none of them had ever seen before, not since Andy and Quynh were held captive. There had been a struggle in her room and it wasn’t hard to know who had taken her: the only person who had known their habits and the skill to pull it off without waking any of them up.</p><p>Andy could feel herself losing all hope for what Quynh and her used to be because if Nile was hurt, it didn’t matter how many years that they spent side by side—she would pay like everyone else.</p><p>When Nile finally returns after so many months away, Andy is the first to wrap her in a hug. Cupping the back of her neck, she pulls Nile close and just holds her there, feeling her hair brush underneath her chin. Alive. Not only alive but alive and free, not trapped, staring down an eternity locked away alone, distant, sharp as stars. So caught up in the joy of not losing another one, Andy couldn’t see Quynh standing just a few feet away, watching, until Nile steps away from her. They lock eyes, there is an emotion swimming in Quynh's eyes that she can almost read, but she cannot see into her heart like she used to.</p><p>It’s broken by Booker yelling, furious that someone went after his sister. Joe and Nicky barely seem to be holding themselves back already pushing forward, and in the commotion, Nile stands in between everyone, an arm out to shield Quynh from Booker’s justifiable rage.</p><p>“She’s home now,” Nile says firmly, but a softness slips between the cracks as she looks in Andy’s eyes.</p><p>
  <em>You have a chance.</em>
</p><p>Neither Nile or Quynh talk about what happened in those months they were away—just another secret in the group of immortals that they long ago learned never to touch.</p><p>Andy and Quynh’s love did not rebuild instantly, but it was allowed to grow once more and she has Nile to thank for that. Quynh allows her to rub her hands over the many scars above her knuckles, traces over the ones she remembers. When Quynh stills at the sight of rain, Andy stands with her shoulder to shoulder until she returns back to her. The familiar feeling of having her back in her blind spot in battle, adjusts to the way she moves quicker but striking accurately just the same. She adjusts to Quynh wanting to hold her, after centuries of being the one to cradle her lover against her chest.  Qunyh wants to make sure that she is there, and not hundreds of miles above her.</p><p>Andy is relearning their language, and she’s grateful just for the chance to speak it again.</p><p>-------</p><p>Two centuries pass and suddenly Andy realizes she has never felt so whole—that aching in her heart has finally ebbed away for good. Nile still fights for what she believes even to the chorus of the whole group’s sighs before they ultimately give in to her desires and everytime the pushback lessens.  They all smile around the dinner table, with the food that Nicky and Joe cook while Quynh tells Nile stories in that game they play where Nile has to guess which are true. Andy would have never guessed that she would feel content like this.</p><p>When she hears Booker and Nile laugh and joke in that way only they can understand, she allows her lips to turn into a smile that he finally has someone to talk to.</p><p>This is why she is surprised when Nile wakes her up to go see her family’s grave instead of Booker. Nile says nothing on the way there, unusually quiet and she found herself missing the sound of Nile's voice.</p><p>The graves where her family rests are still immaculate, as the day they were buried, even after all these years and while Nile doesn’t cry, her eyes still hold that same aching sadness. But a graceful smile appears. It’s not what Andy expects, after all these years she still expects tears, she still expects confliction to arise on her face. Not this solemn peace.</p><p>Andy is right, she does change,  but not in the way that she expects. Not like the immortals before her. </p><p>Her trust extends past their group and into the world instead of receding into itself, she still believes in the goodness of people’s hearts. Nile has aged, but she has not let it make her bitter or worn. That her heart remains open because she forces it to.</p><p>And that this takes more courage than half of the battles they fight.</p><p>Andy doesn’t keep track of how long they stay before Nile turns to leave. Andy tilts her head down to look at the name inscribed into the headstone. Even though she doesn’t believe in the afterlife, she hopes that in the end, Ms. Freeman will be allowed to rest peacefully, looking down on Nile—Nile, whose bravery runs as deep as the river she is named for. Her faith is unwavering, and it’s now her that sometimes Andy looks toward for guidance whenever she feels lost. The person who when Andy is gone, will take care of Quynh and her boys, and all those immortals who will come after.</p><p>The one who taught her that change can be gentle and kind if you allow it to be.</p><p>The sun is setting on the horizon as she reads the name on the grave once again. She lays a gentle hand on the tombstone, eyes closing before she lets out an old prayer from a language that no longer exists. A reverence to the mother that raised such a beautiful and inspiring soul.</p><p>She follows Nile and together they drive towards home. </p><p>They are all going to be awake soon.</p>
  </div></div>
</body>
</html>